Kendrapara: Inhabitants of a seaside village located on the fringes of the Bhitarkanika National Park are a deprived lot with basic facilities like road communication, healthcare and education eluding them for years, a report said.
Decades ago, some people from Contai, Digha and Midnapore in West Bengal came and settled in a coastal pocket of Jamboo panchayat under Mahakalapara block.
The habitation later came to be known as Kandarapatia revenue village. Today the village has a population of about 500 belonging to 57 families. The primary occupation of most of the villagers is marine fishing.
However, the village has been plagued by a host of problems, the major one being lack of road connectivity.
“In the absence of an all-weather road to the village, we commute on a 1.5 km stretch of earthen road. The earthen road was laid by the villagers with the support of MS Swaminathan Foundation,” said Arati Majumdar, secretary of Maa Manasa women’s self-help group.
The situation becomes grim during the rainy season when the villagers have to walk on the muddy road. Sick persons and pregnant woman become the worst sufferers as they have to be carried by their kin to the nearest motorable road.
For high school students of the village, rainy season means undeclared holidays. They hardly attend the high school at Jamboo, which is 4 km away.
Though the villagers have been living here for six decades, they are yet to get record of rights (land patta) for the land from the district administration.
“We have voter identity cards, Aadhaar cards and NFSA ration cards, but fail to get housing benefits as not a single villager has the record of rights for the land,” said Samal Majumdar, the village head.
The village has only two pucca houses –the Anganwadi centre and the primary school.
The four tube wells in the village are insufficient to meet the drinking water needs of the 500-odd residents. The villagers have been demanding the installation of two more tube wells.
Collector Reghu G said he has recently come to know about the problems of the village and would take steps to provide basic facilities to the villagers. PNN
